


Paper Weights

by ardvari



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-14
Updated: 2017-04-14
Packaged: 2018-10-18 23:25:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10627353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ardvari/pseuds/ardvari
Summary: He stands in the middle of what used to be the heart of Homeworld Security, specs of dust hanging on the air in the rectangle of light falling in through the door. It seems as though nobody even bothers to clean these rooms anymore, they’re a relict of a time passed. The war is over, at least for now, hopefully for good, and he has spent the last six months working closely with Landry to secure peace on a galactic scale.





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually part of a dream I had about the third Stargate movie (my dream had beginning and end credits, too), and there will probably be sequels. I blame this on reading too much dystopian fiction before bed.

**Paper Weights**

_We’re fickle, stupid beings with poor memories and a great gift for self-destruction._  
\- Suzanne Collins, “Mockingjay”

He stands in the middle of what used to be the heart of Homeworld Security, specs of dust hanging on the air in the rectangle of light falling in through the door. It seems as though nobody even bothers to clean these rooms anymore, they’re a relict of a time passed. The war is over, at least for now, hopefully for good, and he has spent the last six months working closely with Landry to secure peace on a galactic scale. Homeworld Security will work out of the SGC now; will be separated from Washington and its politics. 

That was one of the first steps Hayes took after the war, moving everything remotely related to the Stargate back to Colorado. Even the ships report to Landry instead of him, and he misses waiting for their databursts with a coffee in his hand, misses waiting for the all-clear. He liked being the first person to know that all is well in the galaxy. Now he gets to work with Daniel on treaties, on laws that will ensure peace in the galaxy. They don’t even have peace on this planet, and trying to keep a whole galaxy free of wars seems like an endless task that will follow him to the grave. 

But he’s not worried about that right now. No, now, he’s worried about certain plans the President’s had in preparation for nearly a year now. Hayes is about to get voted out of office, and his last act as President of the United States will be to make the Stargate program public. It’s the perfect plan, really: Open this particularly large can of worms and leave his successor to deal with the fallout. It’s both brilliant and unfair- incredibly unfair.

The fallout is going to be enormous, and not only on a political level either. There have been meetings with most of Europe, with China, with Australia and New Zealand. He’s glad he’s not part of the negotiations, isn’t part of the long, angry talks about potential wars, about the dangers this world has faced with hardly anyone knowing. He’s fought these wars; he’s lost friends in them. No need to reflect on painful things on a political level, not for him. 

He turns abruptly, walks out of this room he practically lived in for the past five years. By the time he gets to Andrews AFB, there’s a plane waiting for him, so he’s back at the SGC by nightfall. Daniel is still working, high on coffee. He’s in his element, likes these negotiations with other cultures, most of which they’ve met one way or another. Jack’s just glad he’s not the one walking through the ‘gate these days. He’s fine with sending Daniel off with Mitchell and a band of soldiers that seem to be getting younger and younger. There’s one young Captain who, he’s pretty sure, doesn’t even have to shave yet. 

Two days until the President’s announcement to the world. Two days, Jack thinks, until the world as they know it ceases to exist. There’ll be life before the Stargate became public knowledge, and life after. He isn’t sure what exactly this life will look like, thinks back to the time Carter got stranded in an alternate universe, one where martial law had to be declared after the Stargate went public. 

That’s his worst fear- a very real fear, and one that doesn’t quite let him sleep at night. He’d hoped to retire in a world that still resembles the one he fought for, the one he risked his life for. 

They’re not allowing Teal’c to be there when the President announces the existence of the Stargate, but the rest of the original SG-1 is supposed to be there, are supposed to become the faces people associate with the ‘gate. Survivors, all three of them. 

Carter’s still on the Hammond, though the President’s announcement will mark the end of her time in space. The President insists he needs Carter on Earth, so in an instant she’s losing command of her ship in order to make the rounds on the talk show circuit. 

He spends the last day before the president’s announcement holed up with Daniel in his lab, poring over this formulation and that, deciding which planets they need to contact first and which ones can wait. Mostly he’s just a sounding board for Daniel, whose glasses keep sliding down his nose, whose hands gesture wildly, who is so completely in his element that it shows exactly just how much Jack is not. 

Vala is upset that she doesn’t get to come to Washington with them, calling it alienist of them to leave her here while they get to have “all the fun”. Jack thinks about retiring a lot on the flight to Washington, and wonders if there will be any place left to hide once this thing goes live. 

He doesn’t sleep at all that night. He knows that Carter will beam into the Pentagon sometime after midnight, will debrief, will prepare. In the hotel room next to his, Daniel is probably still working on some of the galactic treaties, and Jack wonders if the archaeologist can’t see the forest for the trees. If this larger picture has completely eradicated the life changing event they’ll be a part of tomorrow. Pawns in Hayes’ political game, just faces people are supposed to associate with the ‘gate to make the past decade of fighting more palatable to them. 

As if anyone could actually grasp what they went through, could truly understand the things they lost fighting for this planet. 

He hopes some of them will try, at least. 

The conference room at the White House has been transformed completely. It looks a lot like a theatre stage now, a heavy, blue curtain obscuring a replica Stargate sitting to the right of the podium. It will be revealed and explained during the President’s speech to give people an idea of how it works. 

He thinks the entire thing is stupid, is a little (a lot) too dramatic. He feels like an impostor standing next to the podium, watching the tech geeks hook up the microphones and cameras. They fiddle with the lights that will illuminate the ‘gate. He tugs on his tie, wants to rip it off along with his jacket and the stars burning on his shoulders. 

He’s circled the room five times, feeling caged, when he finally sees her standing by the ‘gate, half obscured by the curtain, but he’d recognize her anywhere. She’s in her Class A’s too, but her hair is loose, parts of it gathered in a barrette at the back of her head. He hasn’t seen her in over six months, has barely even talked to her because she’d been reporting to Landry instead of to him, and still he keeps his steps measured as he walks up to her, comes to stand beside her. 

“It’s a little much, isn’t it?” she asks contemplatively, her head tilted to the side. 

“Which part?” he asks back.

She throws him a look, chuckles softly. It’s a universal constant, the fact that she still laughs at his awful jokes. 

“All of it?” she offers softly, turning towards him a little.

They’re standing a little too close for two people who should just be coworkers, possibly friends. Neither of them moves away because right now it doesn’t matter. A few hours from now, the last thing anyone will be concerned with is whether or not they were, or are, sleeping together. 

“What do you think of all this?”

She shrugs a little, clasps her hands in front of her. Behind the soft lines on her face he can still see his young Captain, touching the ‘gate’s event horizon for the first time, the absolute wonder in her eyes. 

“It was bound to happen eventually. They’ve been gearing up to it for years. It’s a good time because we’re not at war with another species, the galaxy’s finally peaceful, the Lucian Alliance is shattered…” she trails off, bites her lip. 

“There’ll be chaos. People won’t understand. How could they?”

“Maybe we’re not giving them enough credit,” she says.

“Maybe we’re giving them too much.”

“They have a right to know, Jack. When all is said and done, and I’m not saying that I don’t see your point of view, they have a right to know.”

She’s right, and she’s not. She’s always been less pessimistic than him, but he can see the worry on her face, too. She sounds brave but just like him there’s that nagging, underlying feeling of doom. She’s been there, she’s seen it. 

“Tomorrow they’re airing that video they made of us way back when,” he says. 

She nods, looks up at him and smiles. He reaches out, catches a strand of her hair between his fingers and rubs it gently, thoughtfully. 

“If this doesn’t go over well… will you retire to a different planet with me?” he asks, and he can tell she’s trying to figure out if he’s joking. 

They’re called to their spots beside the podium then, and she walks away without giving him an answer, her heels thumping on the carpeted stage. He follows her reluctantly, as if he’s walking to his execution. It feels a little like it, and he’s nervous. He ends up standing next to her, and just before the President walks up to the podium she leans towards him a little, lets the back of her hand brush against his. 

“Always,” she whispers, just before the room grows completely silent.


	2. Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s raining outside when they’re being driven to Andrews AFB. It’s just him and Daniel that will fly back to Colorado, to that brightly lit tomb of the SGC where the real world seems foggy, not real at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More futuristic dreams on my part about the fallout of the Stargate program going public.

**II**

 

_Time is the fire in which we burn._   
\- Delmore Schwartz

It’s raining outside when they’re being driven to Andrews AFB. It’s just him and Daniel that will fly back to Colorado, to that brightly lit tomb of the SGC where the real world seems foggy, not real at all. Carter is with them, sitting across from them with her hands clasped in her lap. 

She has to stay in Washington, President’s orders. He needs her here because she’ll be going on talk shows, because she’s the person he believes to be the most sympathetic. The person people won’t hate but will be able to relate to. 

She’s no girl on fire; she’s a woman with stars in her eyes despite everything she’s seen and all the wars she’s fought. Maybe she’s not perfect for this public role, but she’s better suited for it than Jack or Daniel. Nobody can relate to a bitter General or a bumbling archaeologist/linguist. They need someone who can take a verbal beating, who will fight back when it’s appropriate, who won’t object when it’s not. 

The car slides through the oddly quiet night. He wonders how long it’ll take for people to take to the streets, to riot. He wonders which country will be the first one to issue threats of war. Even if the President is optimistic, he is not. Neither is Daniel, and he knows Sam well enough to know that she’s worried, too. 

It’s surprising that the world is still turning quietly, steadily, uncaring. 

The plane is already waiting for them, the engines idling as it sits on the wet tarmac. Daniel hugs Carter gently then pulls his jacket over his head as he hurries towards the plane. Her eyes are a little teary; she’s not good with goodbyes. She likes hellos and see-you-soons, but neither of them knows what will happen an hour from now, never mind a day, and so this goodbye is hard. 

He hugs her despite the audience, but doesn’t kiss her. Instead he tucks his nose against her neck, breathes in, lets his lips linger against her carotid for a moment before he lets go of her. 

“See you soon,” he says firmly.

She wipes at her eyes, manages a brave but watery smile. 

“You bet,” she answers. 

It takes him back to that time, long ago, when their relationship was still new and a little fragile as they shifted from coworkers and friends to lovers. He still remembers the look in her eyes when he’d pulled her shirt over her head for the first time. 

“Hush,” she’d said when he’d opened his mouth to speak because this wasn’t the right time for words, because Daniel and Teal’c were asleep in the same cabin.

It seems like he will never find the right words at the right time for her. 

He leaves her standing on the wet tarmac, huddled under her umbrella, and stalks towards the plane. Part of the reason why he came to Washington all these years ago was so that no one else would have to. He wanted to deal with the political circus himself, so he could keep his team safe. He’d come to Washington to pave their way, and now the road he laid out for them is destroyed, and when he looks back from the tiny window of the plane, he can see her standing amid the glistening rubble. 

She raises her hand in a shaky salute, a half wave, before she turns and walks back to the car. 

Washington will break her in a way that it never could break him. He knows that because he knows her. 

The SGC is quiet when they get back. Nobody is scheduled to go offworld, but they’re expecting SG-3 back in a few hours. Jack tries to grab a few hours of sleep and ends up staring into the pitch black darkness, his mind unwilling to shut off. 

He finds Daniel in his lab later, bent over his computer screen.

“Have you slept?” he asks in his old, incredulous CO voice.

“Have you?” the archaeologist asks back without looking up. 

Jack grumbles a little, makes a face, and sits down next to Daniel. He reads over his shoulder for a while, but it’s boring stuff and Daniel doesn’t need his help. 

The seconds tick by, then the minutes and hours. Time is bleeding all over the place. Jack watches the news, near-constant talk about the Stargate with bits and pieces of their lives thrown in. 

One newscaster reports on the fight over Antarctica, and an eager scientist talks about the meteor that almost hit Earth years ago. All of these things get washed in this new, public light. It doesn’t matter how many times they all nearly died, what matters is how many times Earth nearly became occupied or annihilated. None of the newscasters or scientists ever blames the aliens out there; they blame the government, the Air Force. They blame him, and Daniel, and Sam for putting this planet in danger.

“What do you think would’ve happened if we’d buried the ‘gate years ago?” Jack finally asks.

Daniel looks up and blinks a few times; working his way out of the diplomatic haze he’s been stuck in. 

“You know what would’ve happened,” he says, pushing his glasses up his nose. 

He stares at Jack for a moment before he focuses on the screen again. 

“You think they would’ve found us?” Jack asks again. He already knows the answer but sometimes he needs to hear these things spoken aloud- a validation of sorts.

“Sooner or later, yes. Probably sooner rather than later,” Daniel shrugs. 

They would have been just another technologically advanced planet conquered swiftly. No means to fight back, nothing. Just terror and blood and enslavement. A snake in the head for the truly unlucky ones, maybe. 

The choices he’s made over the years seem so very right to him that he can’t really believe there are people out there who will now dissect every single one of those choices. That there will be people who will not be sympathetic, who will not get the bigger picture, who will not believe that they did what they did because they didn’t have another option. 

“Sam’s on in an hour,” Daniel informs him when he comes back from a commissary raid with spoils for them both.

They eat pie in Daniel’s lab, apple pie with a little too much cinnamon. The whipped cream is a little stale too, but it doesn’t really matter. It’s pie and this seems like the right time to eat it. 

Carter looks composed on TV, though a little washed out. She’s not wearing her uniform, just slacks and a button-down shirt, and little heels. Her hair is tied back and her eyes keep darting from Julia Donovan’s face to the camera. She’s nervous and it’s obvious in a way that makes Jack wonder what other people, people who don’t know her as well as he does, will think. Will they interpret her nervousness as guilt? Fear?

He doesn’t listen to the questions Donovan asks, just focuses on Sam’s body language- the way her eyes grow steely, her shift in posture when the accusations once they start flying. 

She doesn’t have a choice but to defend the things she’s done, to defend the choices they had to make as a team, the choices the Air Force and the government made. 

“We did what we had to do,” she says icily before the cameras go off. 

Her interview will be translated and broadcasted all over the world. Sam Carter, brilliant scientist, saviour of this planet a dozen times over, has just become a pariah. Of that he’s certain. He wonders how Hayes feels about the fact that his plan to use Sam as a spokeswoman has failed so spectacularly in just one go. 

Daniel sighs, shakes his head. He turns off the TV and looks at Jack for a moment. 

“Brave new world,” he says, resigned, and turns back to his computer.


End file.
